White House Correspondents' dinner just got harder for party crashers

Things got bad around the time you showed up: A crowd scene at a WHCA pre-dinner reception at the Washington Hilton in 2006. (Jonathan Newton/The Washington Post)

Bad news for Washington's junior varsity Salahis: The most crashable (yet crash-worthy) party in town is taking new measures to keep you out.

For years, it has been an open secret in D.C. media-political circles that even if you didn't score a ticket to the elite White House Correspondents' Association dinner, you could still mingle, and drink for free, with the likes of Paul Wolfowitz, Sanjaya of "American Idol" and other VIPs at the pre-dinner receptions. All it took was a tux or ball gown and the confidence to wander the corridors of the Hilton Washington like you were supposed to be there. But no longer. This week, the WHCA alerted media organizations that guests at the May 1 dinner (Jay Leno will entertain; President Obama is expected) will need a dinner ticket or a printed invitation to even walk onto the hotel's concourse level, where most of the receptions are held.

Awww! Why spoil the fun? Because the growing number of crashers, apparently, was spoiling everyone else's. In recent years, "you could hardly move around," said this year's WHCA president, Edwin Chen of Bloomberg, what with the sheer volume of arrivistes trying to get their photo taken with George Clooney or Colin Powell. "It's a general crowd-control issue."